Writing historical docu-drama

If you’re passionate about your subject, this will be a discovery filled part of the journey, before you write a word.If not, don’t write the doc.Write something else that you love.

The production still above is from my TV series ‘Black, White & Khaki’, and this particular scene deals with the British burning of Boer homes, and the placing of their wives and children, as well as the black women and children on the farm, in concentration camps.

The facts on this event were obscured, even hidden or undisclosed, for decades, and it takes some digging to try to get at the truth. The essence, for me, was to try to capture what it felt like, in the script, and in the final picture.

Documentaries, and dramatized documentaries, are growing by popular demand, so if you like the genre, find something you’d really like to say about the history that touches you, and write it… till next time, have a great year.

GoodReads

About

Robert Waldron is a published author, and and internationally acclaimed film maker and scriptwriter. He has produced over fifty natural history and social documentaries that have been broadcast worldwide, in several languages.